London-born Reiki master Shajan has created a wealth of melodic tones, spine-tingling drones, and nature sounds with Music for Reiki and Meditation. What stands out at once is the bold sharpness of many of the notes and tones here; Shajan knows his business and is not afraid to go out on a limb with music that aims straight for pressure areas of the body via the ears. Just as reflexology uses points in the foot to access the rest of the body, Shajan uses the ear via his masterful use of electronic musical tonalities to awaken the spine and nervous system with shivering delight. Thus, while the mind reposes into a gentle state of meditation via birdsong, trickling water, soft wooden-flute pizzicato, and unobtrusive drones, the body is played on like an electric xylophone via Shajan's goose-pimple-inducing electricity.

"Light Touch" begins by layering ascending glissando synths over one another to create a hovering sense of presence; one can feel the tonalities lighting up the spine with the tactile vibrations of a barber's electric razor on the back of the neck-especially when a backsliding tone appears that sounds akin to a crying baby mixed with a weed whacker. Shajan is not wasting any time here. The music hones in on its target like a healing missile before dissolving near the end into a dreamy vocal chorale. The following track, "Hands of Light," opens on the sound of peacefully chirping birds gradually met by echoing plucks of synthesizer strings, creating a sublime sense of the natural external and internal worlds harmonizing.

Each of the album's tracks is an ideal length for beginning meditation, and each is different enough to create its own unique experience-from the gongs sounding like distant thunder in "Journey to the Heart" to the gently crashing surf and echoing pizzicato flute of "Turn of the Tides." A student of an array of musical styles before heeding the inner call of Reiki work, Shajan's music is fully functional as an aid to professional massage therapists and yoga and medititation teachers, made by one who is a master of both healing and musical arts. These sounds are alive and seem to instruct the body in a language that bypasses the mind altogether. Close your eyes, and you can feel yourself guided by his gentle melodic directions; the effect is like a slow awakening of electrical light throughout the body.